Although the world is now facing problem of food shortage, Hong Kong still wastes 2. 12 million tons of foods every year. To abate the seriousness of problem of food wasting, Hong Kong people should change their careless attitude to food and the mind of traditional conspicuous consumption. As Hong Kong Government becomes the pioneer to contribute facilities to control the food wasting problem, Hong Kong people should cooperate with the government.
Be a responsible terrestrial, love the foods which are provided by environment and preserve the dwindling resources on mother earth. Hong Kong is a gourmet paradise, but also a wasteful city in the world. As the world is now facing problem of food shortage, this tiny paradise still waste million tons of foods every year which occupied one – third of solid trash in Hong Kong. Even Hong Kong is running out of landfill space, the problem of food wasting seems getting worse and this is hurting mother earth.
Careless attitude to food and mind of traditional conspicuous consumption from Hong Kong people can help analyze the problem and as the proofs for this essay’s position. When Hong Kong International Airport becomes a pioneer to collect food wastes for composting to help the environment and Hong Kong Government is also trying to help, these are signs of encouraging citizens to cooperate and abate the seriousness of the food wasting problem. In the end, recommendations will be given to encourage people to value and cherish food more, suggest what they can do for help in daily life and what can Hong Kong government do more.
Hong Kong is rich and prosperous, people who live in here can easily to have food and they have ability to enjoy better food. People’s expectations become harder to be satisfied which helps to create lots of bad habits. Green Power, a local non-government organization have made a survey of Mid-Autumn Festival in September, they found out there were two millions of moon cakes are wasted by Hong Kong family, and the result in this year was worse than last year’s. Like last year, some respondents explained that they dumped those moon cakes because they tasted bad and most of moon cakes are not yet to be overdue.
This survey reflects lots of Hong Kong people have a bad concept of “threw out those foods which we think taste bad”. In fact, some parents did not be a good model for children. While people want their children to enjoy better food as they did not have that chance in the old days, they have never taught their children to cherish the food they have. Therefore, children would think that is acceptable to waste if the food does not taste good. In addition, the mind of traditional conspicuous consumption is also one of the food attitudes.
Chinese people always have traditional wedding banquets or annual spring dinners, which usually offer up to twelve courses of different dishes and people usually cannot finish them all. However, people would think the more food they have left over, the richer sign they could have for show off to others. These bad habits should be stigmatized, because people have the responsibility to cherish the food which is given by mother earth. Dining out is Hong Kong people’s eating habit and also a main reason which helps to create so much leftovers.
The Greeners Action, a local environmental group surveyed one thousand diners outside the restaurants in 2006. The survey showed there are only thirty percent of the respondents would finish everything in their meal and over forty percent of them would leave over thirty percent of food or more, especially females. As people cannot finish the whole meal which they have ordered, that means the money they have paid for meal was also wasted. The total value of how much they waste for food which counted by the Greeners Action was two thousand billions HKD every year!
This shockingly enormous amount of money can be used to help many starved people in the world, to provide foods to them and improve their basic living requirements. When the fact seems so bad in Hong Kong, Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) becomes a pioneer to abate the seriousness of food wasting problem. HKIA collects food from food and beverage outlets in their terminals then change them into composting and the waste management in HKIA could reuse and recycle around twelve tons of waste every day.
HKIA will also collect waste cooking oil then recycled into biodiesel. This action is undoubtedly helpful and practical to mother earth. On the other hand, Hong Kong Government’s waste organic treatment facility in North Lantau will be commissioned by 2013-2014, this facility can handle two hundred tons of waste food every day. The source-separated food waste can turn into useful compost by using biological technology. As Hong Kong Government has a well plan to help the food wasting problem, it is a big sign to encourage people to cooperate.
Maybe people would doubt their ability to help, but at least they could start helping in daily life. They should consider clearly if they finish all the things they want before order. When people’s living quality is much improved, it is easy to miss out some basic but important necessaries which are given by mother earth. Hong Kong Government should promote more information about the importance of food and food recycling to the new generation.
Formulate a regulation of recyclable food waste, to create an efficient way to let citizens participate and change their old, traditional thoughts to food. Hong Kong people should also be considerate to the environment and change the old mind. If both sides could work together, it would be easier to abate the seriousness of food wasting problem instead of the government work with their own. Since Hong Kong becomes the food paradise, the problem of food wasting in this tiny city seems getting worse.
While humans are complaining the food is not suitable for their appetite, humans should think about the earth is now facing problem of food and resources shortage, change the attitude to food and try their best to work for the environment. To help the food wasting problem in Hong Kong, not just for saving extra dollars which Hong Kong people have spend on food, but also help preserve the world’s dwindling food resources by human’s little power.
References:
1) Hong Kong International Airport. (n. d. ). Wastes & recycling. Retrieved October 19, 2011 from http://www. hongkongairport. com/eng/csr/environmental-management/wastes-recycling. html
2) Gang ren nian qi yue bing er bai yi shi er wan ge ?????????????. (2011, September 14). Sing Tao Daily ????. Retrieved November 2, 2011
3) Hong Kong Struggles to Cut Food Waste. (2007, May 8). Voice of America. Retrieved November 2, 2011 from http://www. voanews. com/english/news/a-13-2007-05-08-voa11-66714397. html
